Grantee spotlight
Mercer University’s mission is to teach, to learn, to create, to discover, to inspire, to empower and to serve.
What inspired your organization’s work, and/or how has your mission evolved to meet the needs of the people you serve?
Mercer On Mission is a signature program of Mercer University that seeks to make the world a better place through research, service and study abroad. Since 2007, Mercer On Mission has deployed nearly 3,000 students and faculty who have undertaken more than 200 projects around the world that improve the human condition, including providing prosthetic legs and hands to amputees in Vietnam, constructing water systems for water-scarce communities in the Dominican Republic, offering healthcare to orphans in Honduras, and protecting the environment from mercury and lead contamination in Belize.
Can you share a recent and/or significant moment, story, or achievement that reflects the impact of your work?
On June 12, 2016, the Prime Minister of Vietnam, Nguyen Phuc, invited Dr. Ha Vo, Distinguished Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Dr. Craig McMahan, director of Mercer On Mission, to a meeting where he expressed the nation’s gratitude for fitting our 5,000th prosthetic. In the course of that meeting, Prime Minister Phuc stated that Mercer On Mission was the best non-government organization in Vietnam. His only request was to make the program bigger. We have done so. The number of amputees fitted with Mercer prosthetics now stands at more than 24,000.
Beyond funding, what’s one meaningful way people can support your organization and its mission?
Mercer On Mission needs ambassadors and advocates beyond the University. We are always seeking to recruit talented students and faculty to Mercer who have a passion and aptitude for international service work. Having influential advocates to promote the Mercer On Mission program to a wider constituency of prospective students and faculty would make an enormous contribution to the future success of our program and work.